I was tidying up my kitchen a bit this morning when I noticed something that struck me as odd. Some while ago, more than a yearI'm sure but how much more I am not, I bought a matched set of salt and pepper grinders at Shopko. I also bought one jar each of sea salt and peppercorns as refills. Yesterday I finally used up the jar of peppercorns, but I still have over half a jar of salt. I always thought I used them in equal amounts, but apparently not. One thing about the sea salt is that I have noticed that it doesn't taste as salty as regular table salt. Any theories as to why that might be? The only ones I can come up with are that the sea salt isn't pure sodium chloride, or that the iodine added to table salt has something to do with it.
These are the sort of thoughts that occur when you are up all night with nothing to do. Be glad you have day jobs!
Saturday, December 27, 2008
Sunday, December 21, 2008
Max, update
When I got home from work Friday morning Max was doing much better, so much so that I decided he didn't need to go to the vet. He had eaten the food I had placed in his dish before I went to work that night, and when I put more food in it he ate all of that too. That whole day he did very well, and when I went to work Friday night (we had to work Saturday) I didn't give him any meds. He was even better when I got home Saturday morning. But I think he and I overdid things a bit Saturday. I was out shopping and picked up some pig ears for him, and gave him two. They, or all the food he ate must have upset his stomach. When I went to bed he was fine. When my alarms went off at 9:00 p.m. he was fine. I shut them off and went back to sleep. At 1:00 a.m. I woke up and he was shaking, and having another muscle spasm, though not a particularly bad one, I didn't think. But he seemed much more anxious than normal. I took him outside and he pooped. Then he pooped in the house. Then he wanted back out and pooped again. Back inside, he puked on me. He's sleeping now, on the floor of my computer room as I write this. When he wakes up I'll medicate him again, and make a note not to overdo things again, no matter how perky he seems to be.
Thursday, December 18, 2008
Max, continued
I think Max made a little progress in the last 24 hours. Not a lot, but some. When I got home this morning I was a little concerned, because he was lethargic and hadn't eaten much if anything. Nor did he appear to have drunk very much. I tried to give him his medicine, hidden in bits of people food, but he turned up his nose at it. That worried me, because Max loves people food, even the smallest scraps. FYI, hiding his meds in people food is the only way I can get him to take them. With most dogs you just shove the pill down their throat, but Max won't have any of that. Fortunately he is easily duped (i.e. the pills in people food). So when the old trick didn't work...
I called the vet about ten minutes ago to make an appointment for tomorrow, to evaluate his progress and possibly get more meds for him. When I hung up, I tried once more to get Max to take his medicine. Of course, when I set the small plate on the ground, he was all over it. When that was gone I set him front of his water dish and he drank about half of it. Then he ate some dog food (and the raw egg I cracked into it). Not as much as I would like, but he ate some. I wonder if the meds (especially the 'anti-anxiety' stuff) are messing with his appetite a bit.
The vet I talked to Sunday, who was covering for the other local vets including mine (they take turns on weekends I guess), said Max might need two to three weeks of 'kennel rest' to recover fully. That's gonna be tricky because Max doesn't have and never has had a kennel. He doesn't even have a designated 'box' (bed) like my old Dachshund Samantha did. But I've de-jumped my house (couch blocked off, mattress on floor, and I carry him in and out to do his business. So hopefully, with time, he'll be fine. I certainly hope so, because the alternative is not something I want to think about.
I called the vet about ten minutes ago to make an appointment for tomorrow, to evaluate his progress and possibly get more meds for him. When I hung up, I tried once more to get Max to take his medicine. Of course, when I set the small plate on the ground, he was all over it. When that was gone I set him front of his water dish and he drank about half of it. Then he ate some dog food (and the raw egg I cracked into it). Not as much as I would like, but he ate some. I wonder if the meds (especially the 'anti-anxiety' stuff) are messing with his appetite a bit.
The vet I talked to Sunday, who was covering for the other local vets including mine (they take turns on weekends I guess), said Max might need two to three weeks of 'kennel rest' to recover fully. That's gonna be tricky because Max doesn't have and never has had a kennel. He doesn't even have a designated 'box' (bed) like my old Dachshund Samantha did. But I've de-jumped my house (couch blocked off, mattress on floor, and I carry him in and out to do his business. So hopefully, with time, he'll be fine. I certainly hope so, because the alternative is not something I want to think about.
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Max
Sometime Saturday, while I was sleeping, Max jumped off my bed and hurt his back. At first I didn't realize that was what had happened. I thought he had eaten something that disagreed with him and had an upset stomach. I didn't twig to what was actually wrong until Sunday. I got him to the vet first thing Monday morning, and she put him on a six day regimen of oral steroids. I'm not sure that will be long enough. He was doing better Tuesday, but then had a bit of a relapse overnight tonight. He's sleeping right now, after an hour of pathetic whimpering and following me around, staring at me as if I could make everything better. I wish I could, because I hate to see him in any kind of discomfort. He seemed fine when I first got home, but after I put him out to do his business he had another back spasm. Not nearly as bad as the ones he had Monday morning, but not fun I'm sure. I gave him another steroid pill, though that throws off the Doc's plan a bit. She wanted me to give him two a day for two days, then one a day for two days, and then one every other day for four days.
When I had Max at the vet I asked if she could give me some tranquilizers, as Max is fairly high strung. She gave me four, with instructions to give half a pill at a time no more than twice a day. I gave him one this morning, and I'm guessing that is why he's zonked right now. I'll give him another before I go to work tonight, but hold off on the steroid until morning. The tranquilizer may do him as much good as the steroid, if it makes him sleep.
Funny thing, though. Normally Max will snarf down any kind of human food I offer him. This morning he refused to take it. Maybe he knew it had his medicine in it, but I doubt it. I think he was in too much pain to be hungry. But when I put the pill laden food on a plate and set it on the floor, he wolfed it right down.
When I had Max at the vet I asked if she could give me some tranquilizers, as Max is fairly high strung. She gave me four, with instructions to give half a pill at a time no more than twice a day. I gave him one this morning, and I'm guessing that is why he's zonked right now. I'll give him another before I go to work tonight, but hold off on the steroid until morning. The tranquilizer may do him as much good as the steroid, if it makes him sleep.
Funny thing, though. Normally Max will snarf down any kind of human food I offer him. This morning he refused to take it. Maybe he knew it had his medicine in it, but I doubt it. I think he was in too much pain to be hungry. But when I put the pill laden food on a plate and set it on the floor, he wolfed it right down.
Sunday, December 14, 2008
New York, Day Four
Tuesday, 16 Sept '08
Today was a big day with two of the things Chris and I went to New York to do. The day began with us partaking of the hotel's continental breakfast. That was a bit of an odd experience. For openers, it was set up in a special, and very small, room. The usual fare was offered: juice, ceral, bagels, etc. The toaster was of the conveyor type, and was set to such a high rate of speed that I had to send my bagel through three times to get it even a little toasted. For an other oddity,when I was done eating, instead to being allowed to enjoy my coffee, I was chased out by one of the staff, to make room for other guests.
After breakfast I had a small domestic chore to take care of. Even though I had checked a bag, it wasn't a very large bag, and I was low on clean clothes. The hotel advertised that it had laundry facilities for the use of it's guests, but they were out of order. Fortunately in our wanderings around the neighborhood, we had discovered a laundromat just two blocks away. It was an interesting little establishment, complete with a Chinese couple to run it. It offered drop-off laundry service, and a lot of people seem to use it, but they also didn't seem to be in a big hurry to pick up their clean laundry, if the heaps of bags of clothes were any indication. The whole operation was about 15 feet wide and maybe 75 to 100 feet deep, with two dozen fron loading washing machines and half that many dryers. The washers cost $3.75. The dryers were $0.25 for seven minutes, so I ended up spending $1.00 for every load I dried. Soap was $0.50 a box, and dryer sheets $0.25 each. There were no chairs, and no entertainment of any kind. Good thing I brought a book and don't mind standing. Toward the end of my time there Chris called me. I was (and still am) so unused to carrying a cell phone that I didn't even realize it was ringing at first.
When I was done with the laundry I took my leather jacket, which I had brought along but never needed, to a local shoe repair shop that also handled leather clothing. All it needed done was to have a new snap fastener put on the right cuff and a tear in the cloth liner sewed up. The proprietor assured me it would be done at 8 a.m. sharp Friday morning, just in time for Chris and I to head for the airport. Handily the shop was right across Broadway from the 79th Street Station, which would take us straight to Penn Station.
While I'm on the subject of the subway, let me share a few observations about it.
The New York subway system is old, and it looks it's age. Steel or iron pillars hold up the various layers of each station, and ultimately support the weight of the street and all vehicular traffic thereon. That means there a lot of pillars. The ties that hold the rails are made of wood, no station has pristine tile work, and there is a lot of exposed wiring and piping.
Its dirty, too. There was trash on the tracks, on the platforms, basically everywhere. There wasn't tons of trash, but apparently the tracks don't get cleaned very often.
And hot. It was always warm, and sometimes very warm, on the platforms and elsewhere. Clearly, adequate ventilation was not a high priority for the designers, despite all the heat coming off electric motors and friction brakes.
Finally, the stations can be nightmarish mazes. Not all of them are, of course, but multi-layer stations where two or more lines meet are quite difficult to find your way around in. This is in no small part to woefully inadequate signage. The London Underground is, or at least was, vastly better in every regard. The New York MTA could take a few lessons from the Brits as far as I'm concerned.
Lunch today was at a favorite establishment of Chris', Frankie and Johnnies Steakhouse at 269 W. 45th St. It is an upstairs establishment with seating for sixty-six. If I had to describe it in one word, that word would be 'cozy'. Apart from Chris and myself there were just two other customers. The waiter was a elderly Cypriot gentlemen who was funny and engaging who sat down and talked with us after we were done eating. Chris had filet mignon with mushrooms and a glass of Johnny Walker Gold (fifteen years old), while I availed myself of a sirloin with au gratin potatos, chicken noodle soup and a glass of Gragganmore (sixteen years old). My potatos were a little unusual in that they were made with parmesan cheese instead of cheddar, but they were still quite good. And the whole affair set me back just $171.00, including the tip. Some lunch. It was very good, but I'm not sure it was worth that much. Still, I don't reget it.
How was my drink? It was scotch, which somewhat sadly says it all. I used to drink scotch when I was in the Air Force, but I lost my taste for it. Maybe I just decided that the trio of friends in the movie 'Mr. Roberts' were right about scotch. In that film they make a bottle of 'scotch' with water, medicinal alcohol, liquid shoe polish and iodine, and that's pretty much what all scotch tastes like.
After lunch we wandered around lower Manhatten, specifically Chelsea and Greenwich Village. Chris promisied me freak show, but few were to be seen. We later decided that it was too early in the day for the freaks to be out. While in Chelsea we stopped at the Chelsea Market, but didn't explore even a fraction of it. Doing a little research as I write this tells me that the market is in a converted Nabisco factory where the Oreo cookie was developed. I wish I had been paying more attention while we were in the area, because I also later learned that an abandoned elevated railroad called the High Line passes through the market and the neighborhood. I also learned (just tonight) that Iron Chef's Masaharu Morimoto and Mario Batali both have restaurants in the Market, and that Iron Chef America is filmed there. The High Line is of special interest because it is in the process of being converted into an elevated park and walking path.
The other highlight of this day was, of course, going up to the Bronx to see the Yankees play the White Sox. We took the Red Line down to Times Square, the Purple Line #7 to Grand Central Station and finally the Green Line #4 Express to Yankee Stadium. That is the offical name of the stop, by the way, and even though it's part of the subway system, the station and the tracks for a good way to either side are not only above ground, they're elevated. The Express was packed, naturally, and there was a nice crowd at the ballpark. The seats Chris had gotten us were quite good, about halfway up, along the outfield portion of the 3rd base line (in fact we were almost to the foul pole). We chatted with some of the people around us, who were uniformly nice.
I hadn't been to a professional baseball game in twenty years or so, and it was interesting to see one again. The Sox led off and quickly dominated the game. they made a few mistakes, mostly in trying to force plays when they had the lead, but they never lost that lead. Derek Jeter did manage to break Lou Gerhig's hit record at Yankee Stadium by tagging his 1,270th, but the most amazing thing that happened was pure chance. Yankee stadium had a strict ban on cameras and video cameras, but that rule was widely ignored, my myself as well. My new digital camera can also take video, and Chris asked to borrow it so he could make a short vid for a friend at work. So he takes the camera and starts filming, just as a Yankee batter hits a home run. Unbelievable.
Supper this evening was, as you might expect, hot dogs and beer at the game. Chris had a giant pretzel too.
The trip back to the hotel was much quicker and easier that the trip to the stadium. I happened to notice that the Green Line intersected with the Red Line just one station down from the Stadium, so we got off there and and took a much more direct, less crowded train back to the hotel.
Today was a big day with two of the things Chris and I went to New York to do. The day began with us partaking of the hotel's continental breakfast. That was a bit of an odd experience. For openers, it was set up in a special, and very small, room. The usual fare was offered: juice, ceral, bagels, etc. The toaster was of the conveyor type, and was set to such a high rate of speed that I had to send my bagel through three times to get it even a little toasted. For an other oddity,when I was done eating, instead to being allowed to enjoy my coffee, I was chased out by one of the staff, to make room for other guests.
After breakfast I had a small domestic chore to take care of. Even though I had checked a bag, it wasn't a very large bag, and I was low on clean clothes. The hotel advertised that it had laundry facilities for the use of it's guests, but they were out of order. Fortunately in our wanderings around the neighborhood, we had discovered a laundromat just two blocks away. It was an interesting little establishment, complete with a Chinese couple to run it. It offered drop-off laundry service, and a lot of people seem to use it, but they also didn't seem to be in a big hurry to pick up their clean laundry, if the heaps of bags of clothes were any indication. The whole operation was about 15 feet wide and maybe 75 to 100 feet deep, with two dozen fron loading washing machines and half that many dryers. The washers cost $3.75. The dryers were $0.25 for seven minutes, so I ended up spending $1.00 for every load I dried. Soap was $0.50 a box, and dryer sheets $0.25 each. There were no chairs, and no entertainment of any kind. Good thing I brought a book and don't mind standing. Toward the end of my time there Chris called me. I was (and still am) so unused to carrying a cell phone that I didn't even realize it was ringing at first.
When I was done with the laundry I took my leather jacket, which I had brought along but never needed, to a local shoe repair shop that also handled leather clothing. All it needed done was to have a new snap fastener put on the right cuff and a tear in the cloth liner sewed up. The proprietor assured me it would be done at 8 a.m. sharp Friday morning, just in time for Chris and I to head for the airport. Handily the shop was right across Broadway from the 79th Street Station, which would take us straight to Penn Station.
While I'm on the subject of the subway, let me share a few observations about it.
The New York subway system is old, and it looks it's age. Steel or iron pillars hold up the various layers of each station, and ultimately support the weight of the street and all vehicular traffic thereon. That means there a lot of pillars. The ties that hold the rails are made of wood, no station has pristine tile work, and there is a lot of exposed wiring and piping.
Its dirty, too. There was trash on the tracks, on the platforms, basically everywhere. There wasn't tons of trash, but apparently the tracks don't get cleaned very often.
And hot. It was always warm, and sometimes very warm, on the platforms and elsewhere. Clearly, adequate ventilation was not a high priority for the designers, despite all the heat coming off electric motors and friction brakes.
Finally, the stations can be nightmarish mazes. Not all of them are, of course, but multi-layer stations where two or more lines meet are quite difficult to find your way around in. This is in no small part to woefully inadequate signage. The London Underground is, or at least was, vastly better in every regard. The New York MTA could take a few lessons from the Brits as far as I'm concerned.
Lunch today was at a favorite establishment of Chris', Frankie and Johnnies Steakhouse at 269 W. 45th St. It is an upstairs establishment with seating for sixty-six. If I had to describe it in one word, that word would be 'cozy'. Apart from Chris and myself there were just two other customers. The waiter was a elderly Cypriot gentlemen who was funny and engaging who sat down and talked with us after we were done eating. Chris had filet mignon with mushrooms and a glass of Johnny Walker Gold (fifteen years old), while I availed myself of a sirloin with au gratin potatos, chicken noodle soup and a glass of Gragganmore (sixteen years old). My potatos were a little unusual in that they were made with parmesan cheese instead of cheddar, but they were still quite good. And the whole affair set me back just $171.00, including the tip. Some lunch. It was very good, but I'm not sure it was worth that much. Still, I don't reget it.
How was my drink? It was scotch, which somewhat sadly says it all. I used to drink scotch when I was in the Air Force, but I lost my taste for it. Maybe I just decided that the trio of friends in the movie 'Mr. Roberts' were right about scotch. In that film they make a bottle of 'scotch' with water, medicinal alcohol, liquid shoe polish and iodine, and that's pretty much what all scotch tastes like.
After lunch we wandered around lower Manhatten, specifically Chelsea and Greenwich Village. Chris promisied me freak show, but few were to be seen. We later decided that it was too early in the day for the freaks to be out. While in Chelsea we stopped at the Chelsea Market, but didn't explore even a fraction of it. Doing a little research as I write this tells me that the market is in a converted Nabisco factory where the Oreo cookie was developed. I wish I had been paying more attention while we were in the area, because I also later learned that an abandoned elevated railroad called the High Line passes through the market and the neighborhood. I also learned (just tonight) that Iron Chef's Masaharu Morimoto and Mario Batali both have restaurants in the Market, and that Iron Chef America is filmed there. The High Line is of special interest because it is in the process of being converted into an elevated park and walking path.
The other highlight of this day was, of course, going up to the Bronx to see the Yankees play the White Sox. We took the Red Line down to Times Square, the Purple Line #7 to Grand Central Station and finally the Green Line #4 Express to Yankee Stadium. That is the offical name of the stop, by the way, and even though it's part of the subway system, the station and the tracks for a good way to either side are not only above ground, they're elevated. The Express was packed, naturally, and there was a nice crowd at the ballpark. The seats Chris had gotten us were quite good, about halfway up, along the outfield portion of the 3rd base line (in fact we were almost to the foul pole). We chatted with some of the people around us, who were uniformly nice.
I hadn't been to a professional baseball game in twenty years or so, and it was interesting to see one again. The Sox led off and quickly dominated the game. they made a few mistakes, mostly in trying to force plays when they had the lead, but they never lost that lead. Derek Jeter did manage to break Lou Gerhig's hit record at Yankee Stadium by tagging his 1,270th, but the most amazing thing that happened was pure chance. Yankee stadium had a strict ban on cameras and video cameras, but that rule was widely ignored, my myself as well. My new digital camera can also take video, and Chris asked to borrow it so he could make a short vid for a friend at work. So he takes the camera and starts filming, just as a Yankee batter hits a home run. Unbelievable.
Supper this evening was, as you might expect, hot dogs and beer at the game. Chris had a giant pretzel too.
The trip back to the hotel was much quicker and easier that the trip to the stadium. I happened to notice that the Green Line intersected with the Red Line just one station down from the Stadium, so we got off there and and took a much more direct, less crowded train back to the hotel.
Saturday, December 13, 2008
Doggie Ills Con't
Max seems to have fully recovered from whatever it was that made him sick, although he hasn't done much but sleep in the time since. Apparently being ill took a lot out of him. I just wish I could figure out what caused this in the first place: as I noted, he didn't have anything that he hasn't had before without getting sick as a result. I guess I'll just have to be more careful about how much 'people food' he gets from now on.
Doggie Ills
Max is sick, and I don't know why. He seems to have an upset tummy, if the nasty farts and explosive diahrrhea are any sign. Oddly though, he isn't puking. This sort of thing usually happens when I'm stupid enough to let him gnaw a steak bone, or eat too much fat (fat being the main culprit in these instances). But he hasn't had any fat. All he's had to eat besides dog food is a little egg goop (remains of yolk from fried eggs I ate) and a few tiny pieces of bread with margarine, neither of which has ever made him sick before. I hate seeing him like this, because I have no idea what's wrong. He just huddles on the floor, shivering, and though he seems better now (several hours having passed since the beginning of the illness) he's still not well.
All I can assume is that his digestion, always delicate, is becoming more so as he gets 'chronologically advantaged' (that's 'old' for you PC types).
All I can assume is that his digestion, always delicate, is becoming more so as he gets 'chronologically advantaged' (that's 'old' for you PC types).
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)